Bonus picture of the hand forged hinges, you don’t have to pay extra for these, they are included in your admission price! “Beautifully clocked screws” you said. “Thanks!” I replied.

Let’s start with the middle till. This is where I put small planes and I added two permanent dividers to this till. On the right I put my block plane, skews and chisel plane and the “stuff” ...fence & edge guard thing I don’t use. This is the easiest spot to grab for a right hander.

The left third of this till got the “little guys”. That’s a #1 and a #2 along with a 98 and 99 plus a cute little plane I’ve never used. I saw Mario Rodriguez use one for trimming a “L” shaped drawer stop located on the front of a drawer divider and I bought one. I’ll use it soon.

The center section I used for my shoulder planes and beader. These are longer and took more space. I felt I’d use them more and this keeps them easy to reach. I also have my small router plane here. The bags are extra beading blanks and router blades. The other metal thing goes to a Lie-Nielsen product but I don’t know what! I think it’s a fence so I better keep it.

Here’s a random shot of the crab lock, just to switch up the narrative.Double Bonus! The other side showing the escutchion, key and the lamb’s tongue detail I carved to serve as a lift. “Yes, those are cut nails I used as extra security on the dust seal. You pick up on all the details.”

Back to the tills, this time the deep bottom till. On the left side goes my chairmaking tools like a scorp and adz along with spoon bits and a set up block.

Here’s my spokehsaves all pretty in their case

which I put on the bottom right side of this till. That partial handle is a coping saw and I know you recognize braces when you see them. Plus a mallet is there.

Bonus shot of the dovetails on the tills.

That leaves the top till to review. This is what I call the measuring and marking till. It has my marking gauges and mortise gauge. There is a plumb bob in there and then scrapers and c clamps. Next are squares and dividers. I’ll get you picture of the right side of this till later, it’s got good stuff there you’ll want to see.

That’s it for now. The next installment will be the bottom of the chest and the front section. Thanks for following along.

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Tue, 15 Apr 2014 02:21:18 GMThttp://lumberjocks.com/kenn/blog/40746kennkennBickford Molding planeshttp://lumberjocks.com/kenn/blog/37226
I seem to be falling deeper and deeper down the hand tool rabbit hole. Somewhere near the bottom of that hole, a guy orders a half set of hollows and rounds from Matt Bickford and waits about 18 months to open the box.

They sure are packed nice. I won’t need to buy any burlap for a while, probably ever. They look nice on the table and I feel like it is Christmas morning.

The rabbit and side round planes with shavings!

Thanks Matt, but I have plenty of shavings spread throughout the house by the cats, I don’t need you to send me more.

Actually, that was to show the proper blade position for those planes. Let’s open some more.

This is what a “Matched Pair” looks like. Sweeeet. I love it.

Bonus picture of a plane body, iron and wedge.

If you wonder why a person would buy a new wooden body plane when there are so many olds one out there, look at how tight this mouth is then go look at the antique one’s mouth. Plus, somebody has to feed Matt’s kids. And I want to spend my shop time making heirloom furniture for my family (just in case the wife checks up on me). ;)

I also bought a pair of side rounds

and a pair of snipes bill.

Here is a shot of the family (argh! Stupid photobucket cuts off the snipe bills, trust me, they are there).

Now I’ll be making a proper home for these babies and adding molding to anything that stops moving. Watch out!

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Fri, 09 Aug 2013 01:17:42 GMThttp://lumberjocks.com/kenn/blog/37226kennkennLogs to lumber, wood gloathttp://lumberjocks.com/kenn/blog/37222
Cherry and walnut for 40 cents a board foot! What a deal. My Dad lives on a nice 7 acre patch of woods that has been hit with several episodes of damaging winds. The end result was lots of trees down and some usable for lumber, not firewood. Here’s the walnut we pulled out to cut into boards.

Here’s the cherry that we had. The crotch log 5th in from the the left was rotten and ended up in the firewood stack but it is still a nice bunch of logs.

And here is the stack of mostly ash, but I think there might have been some hickory in there too.

I went online and used the woodmizer website to find a nearby sawyer. He pulled up in his rig just as I was pulling up with the doughnuts for the workers.

Here was ready in a flash. In no time at all, the first log was loaded and we were making lumber.

He would cut off the slab wood

then start cutting boards and turning the log to get the best lumber for me.

My workers stacked and stickered the boards. That is my favorite nephew, I picked the week he was visiting for this project. He knew we were moving a lots of wood. When he saw the stacks of logs he said “I don’t think I can lift those by myself, but I’ll try.” That is what gets a kid moved into the favorite nephew slot.

My Dad has a backhoe (I suggest everybody should have one to help out around the house). That is what loaded the logs. Meanwhile the woodmizer just kept slicing boards.

It wasn’t long before I had a nice stack of cherry.

The stacks of boards grew

and grew

and the sawdust pile grew until it had to be shoveled away.

Here we are lining up for that cherry crotch, too bad it went towards heat and not furniture.

I did get a few specialty boards. The top short ones are walnut crotch and the wavy ones in the front are cherry that I want to use for legs on three leg tables.

By the end of the day, a rest was well earned. Thanks to my cousin Dean (walking left), daughter Lizzie (catching some rays), nephew Chris (walking away, headed for a chair), step Mom Heidi (resting), and Pete (who had enough energy that he worked on some firewood). Not pictured but vital to the project were the backhoe operator (Dad) and my number one helper on all projects (son, Michael).

That is a nice stack of lumber!

It cost about $500 for those stacks. I think it is about 2000 bd. ft. It includes cherry, walnut, sycamore, ash and hickory. It’ll be enough for my lifetime. Thanks Dad for letting me have them.

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Fri, 09 Aug 2013 00:51:10 GMThttp://lumberjocks.com/kenn/blog/37222kennkennFive years!http://lumberjocks.com/kenn/blog/35126
Today is my 5 year anniversary! This site has been good for me. I like seeing and being inspired by others work. As you know, it is difficult to find a community of like minded woodworkers in the real world but this community is the best one ever.

I had hernia surgery yesterday, so I am banned from the shop while I recover. I’ll try to post a few outstanding items that I have needed to share while I am laid up. This past 18 months, I have been putting my shop back together after flooding messed everything up. I will get that updated for you as well.

My point is 1). I like being here with you and seeing what is up in your shops, 2). I am going to try to share my activities better in the coming months, 3). Thanks for the past 5 years, 4). Martin and Debbie have given me a great place to hang out.

Hears to the next 5 years.

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Tue, 19 Mar 2013 17:09:58 GMThttp://lumberjocks.com/kenn/blog/35126kennkennFLOODED in Pennsylvaniahttp://lumberjocks.com/kenn/blog/25372
Well, I live at the epicenter of the flood in PA. My little town was unaccessable from all directions yesterday but we can get around now. My current status is about an inch of water made it into the basement and ruined the carpet. No other real damage to my house. My daughter, who’s getting married in8 days in the backyard, has her townhouse they were going to move into on the Susquehanna River. At the moment, water should be entering their 1st floor and current projections put about 4’ in the 1st floor.

Here’s my saga. Katie, my daughter, has had us helping get her home ready over Labor Day wekend. Painted the first floor, mater bedroom and bathroom last Sat. Sunday we worked on cleaning, a few minor repairs and setting up the TV. Mon we worked on hooking up the surroung sound, but I left early because my other daughter was headed back to State College. Tues I worked on my clock wedding gift that I’ve blogged about. Tues on the 11:00 news, the Susquehanna River projection was to crest at 24.5 ft which means for Katie, water on the 1st floor. The last flood they had was 24.4 ft and the carpet stayed dry. I didn’t sleep much thinking about what she should do.

Thurs morning texted and talked to her and advised her to stay home from work and prepare for a flood. By noon she called for help. I checked my sump pump before leaving and the well was full. Jiggled the float and the pump kicked on and started working. Took my son & truck and went to help Katie. Went spent several hours moving all the big stuff up to the second floor. I sent my son home. It took him over 2 hrs for a 20 min drive and without local road knowledge abd GPS help he wouldn’t have made it.

Katie and I finished up. We left 2 couches, a corner cupboard and some bins that her inlaws were to pick up on the 1 st floor. She has some dishes and appliances in the upper cabinets, about 4 1/2 ft off the floor. By then many roads between her location and my house were flooded. My wife was stranded at the Hershey Medical Center where she works. My son wasn’t home yet. I called my step Mom and they went to check on my house & sump pump. They found about an inch of water in the finished basement, carpet ruined, and did a great job saving most of the stuff.

I plotted a route in my head for Katie & I to get to Palmyra going the round about way. We passed flooded field about 1/2 mile wide from 10ft wide creeks. The water was at the white striope on the side of the road there. Later we drove through about a foot of fast flowing water and made it. Traffic backed up everywhere. Saw a cop who told us there was no way into our town from Hershey, 5 miles. made the decision to head to a resturant in Hershey for dinner and drinks because we were going to stay with a friend of Katie’s nearby. Decided against driving through about18” of water and found another way that had us drive through 6” of water.

Made it to an open resturant, Fennicci’s. Dinner, drinks. Katie’s upset, crying then laughing hysteriacally. Her first home with her husband is going to seriously fllood. Her fiance is in Buffalo and who knows how he’ll get here. She’s got 70 people comomg to a house she can’t even reach. We went to Rite Aid for toiletries. the cleck ther tells us she live next to our subdivision and she just got to work, the road is open.

Back to the car and an easy drive home. Called my wife, who had decided to drive about 20 miles around to attempt to get home from the north. She couldn’t and had found a hotel room without power. I told her how she could make it and she did. We spent last night carrying stuff out of the basement and trying to safe what could be saved. My wife and son took turns manually starting and stopping the sump pump all night. Katie & I tried to rest.

Today, Thurs., we’ve got the stuff secured. My tool appear safe. Some clamps got wet. Some wood got stained. The clock project looks safe. It was sitting on a high spot on concete covered with carpet. Thank you, Lord. I just installed a new sump pump so we won’t have to manually operate the switch and we’ll all be able to get some sleep. We’ve started tearing up the carpet, only about a 4’ wide strip so far, but we’ve got a plan and everything together & organized.

My neighbors have a 4’ sinkhole opening by their mailbox and it looks like the ground is about to give way and open it up to 20’. We’ll get the basement carpet out of there Fri and start the dehumindifiers drying things out. sat Katie’s bridesmaid & Mom arrive. They have been in the US for awhile but are from Australia. They were going to stay in the basement but now will head to my Dad’s.

If it dries out soon, we’ll start getting ready for a wedding. The dogs get boarded next Wed, tent arrives Thurs, rehearsal Fri abd wedding Sat. No stress here, huh?

After that, my shop is moving to the larger side of the basement. Former shop side will be storage. We’ll leave the wall and ceiling finished but are done with the carpet. I’m going to put down horse stall mats, ala Chris Schwartz. New area will be 13’6” by 25” with an additionnal bump out for the scroll saw and one that the lathe will llok great in. That might be the best news of this mess, other than all are safe, including the fiance who made it to his Dad’s.

Sorry for the typo and grammer mistakes, I’m tired and not proofreading this. Going to have a bourbon, or two, and watch football. Tomoorow is a new day.

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Fri, 09 Sep 2011 03:56:45 GMThttp://lumberjocks.com/kenn/blog/25372kennkennWedding Clock #11: Tick-tock, Ding-donghttp://lumberjocks.com/kenn/blog/24574
I have officially made a clock! It ticks, it tocks, it dings and dongs. I can hear the chimes ringing as I write this update for you. Here’s what I’ve done to be able to call this an actual clock.

I’ve added a support to the dado I cut in the sides. This one is for the dial door. You can see the dado for the mechanism support behind it. Here’s a head on shot of the mechanism support too. That all looked fine but I thought that adding a cross piece at the top would be a good idea. It’ll lock everything in place and add some additional strength. So I mortised the vertical supports after clamping them together so I didn’t blow anything out. Since the sides of this clock slant, a traditional mortise and tenon joint won’t work. There’s no way to get it into the clock carcass. I left the top of the mortise open (is that a bridle joint? I’m not sure) and that way I’ll slip the tenons into position. Everything went well and the supports are glued and locked into place.

Now it’s onto the door. I’ll need a door to hold the copper dial that I had made. I’m using some popping birdseye maple and chopped the mortises. Then it’s time to cut and fit the tenons. Now it’s nerve wracking time! I’ve got to cut that expensive, fancy, impossible to replace, hand hammered copper dial. I used a marking guage and triple checked my calculations as to how much need removed. Tin snips did the work and it was fine. Whew! A dry fit, then some glue and clamps, here it is. That went well. Now I got my hardware organized. That door will need hinges and a pull. The pull needed a stepped hole. This is the first set of hinges that I’ve installed. I did most of the work with a chisel but got my little router plane into the game for the final finish. This was the first time it saw action and she did a great job.
Here’s a look at what I’ve done. The clock is upright and the dial door is in place. I laid it back down on the bench and put the mechanism in place. As you can see, I’ve got to get the optimal postion for the center and the three winding posts. A bit of fussing and I’m happy with it. I made riser block that I could screw to the shelf and put the chimes in the right position. I had a lot of taking the mechanism in and out so there’s a clamp holding one corner while I adjust things. Since #4, 1/2” screws hold the mechanism in place, I used an eggbeater drill to make some pilot holes. Here we are, chimes in place, mechanism screwed in place, ready for a test run. Here’s look at what I’ve done! It’s a clock! Just as a reminder, this is my goal. A clock from the Grove Park Inn except I am using cherry and birdseye maple.

I think I am doing well. It looks great, sounds great and the bride to be seems excited about it. The groom is sitting for the bar and hasn’t seen it lately. I am cautiously optimistic that I’ll have it done by the wedding, now 7 weeks, 4 days away. We’re heading out to the beach so progress will be halted for the next week or two.

I need to make the upper door (mitered, splined and with a round, centered window) and the lower door. Plus I want to go over the finish and clean up any imperfections (and gouges, like the one the bride helped put in it while we were moving it). All things considered, I’ll be able to relax on the beach, enjoy my adult beverages and not stress over my clock project. Thanks for following, one more entry and this will be done!

Here’s two final pictures of my progress, enjoy.

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Wed, 27 Jul 2011 02:56:02 GMThttp://lumberjocks.com/kenn/blog/24574kennkennWedding Clock #10: Like Frankenstein, It Stands Uphttp://lumberjocks.com/kenn/blog/24175
I am up to the nerve wracking part of this build. I need to put some dados into the sides of the clock, but since both the sides and front/back are angled, the dados need to be angled. I’ve been thinking about how to do this since I started this project. Use a stack dado set and the table saw? Yeah, that would work, but I don’t think the cut will be as precise as I need it to be and the cut would register on the front edge of one side and the back edge of the other side. That seems like a mistake waiting to happen.

I think I am going to go the router path. Here’s what I decided, first, I wanted to locate the top and bottom shelves from the rails on the front. I just lined it all up and made a mark. I had kept the back of both sides straight so that I could reference off of it to this mark. That let me scribe a line across the side at the proposed top of the shelf. Then, with Father’s Day coming up, I requested a new tool. I figured a trim router would be better for this job. Plus Fine Woodworking had just published a review of trim routers. Lucky me, I got a DeWalt 661 trim router package for Father’s Day. So I made a little jig that shows right where the bit will cut, nothing hard, just a fence glued to a piece of plywood that I then routed away the excess leaving me what the bit will leave. Let’s make those dados! This was the most nerve wracking thing, I had put a ton of work into getting these sides to look good and I did not want any screw ups at this stage. So guess what happened? When I was routing the grooves that will hold the clock’s mechanism, I had clamped my jig partially off the the side…it moved. Here’s what I did to fix that and a view of the dados. If you look closely, you’ll see the left side has a groove that is wider than the others. I made a plug to go into that groove and rerouted, a little less deep. Plus the second dado down on the left has little “wander” where I didn’t hold to the jig well enough. It’s the underside of a shelf and I can’t think of how that can be fixed, so it’ll stay. If somebody sees it, I’ll yell at them “Get your head out of that clock!!”

I don’t need that square reference surface on the back of the sides anymore. Off to the bandsaw to cut that to its intended slant. I cleaned those sides up while clamped together with my handplanes. Now they are both the same shape. After much thought, I realized that the easiest thing would be to set up a bevel square with the angle I needed the dados to be and chisel the bottom edge to that angle. Plus, I could then trim that as needed with a block plane to get each shelf married to its dado. Here we go. That went great. I was a little surprised but pleased. I just worked my way through them, pausing every once in a while to look at them standing there. As you can see, they are not cut to width yet. Then I wanted to remove the finish from my upcoming joint for the glue and create a rabbet for the side to register into. I used a skew block plane with the fence set the width of the side. The front and back got rabbets on their insides. Now I actually need to glue this thing together. A drop of Titebond III in each shelf’s dado at the front, place the selves in, run hide glue down the rabbet (I didn’t have total confidence in the glue up being right so the reversibility of hide glue appealed to me and I wanted the quick tack that hide glue gives you) and place the side onto the front, clamp and wait. Here’s one side in the clamps. No problems, my glue team came together for me. We glued the sides to the front, no problem. I wanted to add some corner blocks at the legs for extra strength. I used a chisel to peal away the finish, and glued some blocks in there. Next, I layed the clock body onto the back and scribed a line where the rabbet needed adjusted. I increased the depth of the rabbet and made it to fit the width that the clock body now required. Once that fit well dry, I assembled my team and we glued. Hide glue on the rabbets with the body then lifted into place and apply clamps (FYI, got some new clamps out of this project, too). I had left the sides inset a bit so they could be trimmed flush. Who’s best for that job? I think it’s the block plane to start and the Low Angle #4 to finish. Here’s some plane pictures. After that, it’s time to stand up and start looking like a clock. Looks good, huh? Within 3 minutes of setting it upright for the first time, my daughter’s cat climbed onto one of the shelves and laid down like it was made for her. I’ve got BLO on the sides in these pics but will be putting shellac onto them tommorow. Once that’s all satisfactory, it’s onto the “guts” of the clock. It is now 10 weeks and 5 days until the wedding. I think I’ll lose 2 weeks of work on this project for vacation and the week of wedding prep. Still seems tight on whether it’ll be done. At least it’s upright. Thanks for following.

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Tue, 05 Jul 2011 01:17:53 GMThttp://lumberjocks.com/kenn/blog/24175kennkennWedding Clock #9: Sideshttp://lumberjocks.com/kenn/blog/23894
Now that the front and back have been assembled, I’m on to making the sides and the shelves that will sit in dados cut into the sides. Today’s blog is getting thoses sides made and ready for the dado process. That means basic milling. So I start with rough lumber, layed out for the best match I think. I check the direction the grain is running by planing a bit on each piece. This will allow the grain to be running the same when the whole piece is glued up and, hopefully, make planing easier later. See my little arrows, that means plane from this end. Then it’s a matter of jointing the edge and glueing up the side. Easy to write, tough to do since you want the finished piece to be as flat as you can make it. If your joint has a slant to it, the finished piece will be thin once it’s flat. Some people clamp both boards togther to solve this, I just work one at a time and adjust one board until they both are where I want them. Here one side is glued up. Then it’s on to flattening one side. I use winding sticks and a #5 plane for this job. These sides glued up at about 15” and I want them to be about 14” at the wide end when done. I have a Dewalt 735 planer, which goes up to 13” wide. My neighbor, Russ, has a 15” planer so it’s off to Russ’ to run these sides through his planer. Thanks, Russ! Then they go back to the shop after the field trip. Now the sides are flat and parrallel and resting. Now I use my #5 1/2 plane to remove the planer marks. You can see the cross hatch lines that I use to tell where the side has been planed and what still needs done. The areas with the hatch marks remaining are slight valleys. To get them, I’ll have to keep planing the mountains, areas without hatch marks, until they are all the same depth. just alittle explanation for the non woodworking family & friends that are following this project. Here’s a shot of a shaving, just to show off a bit. Look how long, wide and thin that baby is. It is great when those kinds of shavings are pouring out of the mouth of a plane. Then I laid out and cut the taper on the front of the side. I am going to keep the back square for now, it will provide a refence face for me when I cut the daos into the sides. A plane cleans up the edge. I actually had to go back again and redo this. After I got both sides ready, I clamped then together and planed them togther. That way, my clock will be square (hopefully) when I glue it up. Then I laid the front frame right where it belongs and used it to mark the finished length. This should keep things correct and level. Now that’s progress. I put some BLO on the inside. It looks great, I’m feeling good. However, I accidently got mixed up and put BLO on the outside of one side. I had planned on waiting and doing this after the clock was assembled. I’ve been trying to finish only the inside, thinking that it will be very difficult to get the finish to be perfect with all of those shelves and inside corners. Now I’ll have to be careful that I don’t confuse the inside and outside of that one side that’s finished on both sides. No, I didn’t mess it up and I don’t want to.

I drilled the holes for the bottom profiles, no issues with that since they were full holes and no short grain to deal with. Then I got down my “cute little bowsaw” as the bride to be a calls it, and cut out the waste. A little rasp work and I had the side ready. This picture is of the side with BLO on both sides, that’s why I confessed earlier. There they are, vertical, in front of their mates. Then I thought I’d get the shelves ready. I think I already showed you their glue ups. I finish sanded them and lined them up for some BLO. I also did the pieces that will form the frame around the dial. These are my best looking pieces of birdseye, I can’t believe the figure in them. Don’t they look amazing with the BLO bringing the eyes to life? Here I am wiping down the BLO on one of the shelves. I just love to see the wood start to come together. Alright, that’s where I am as of tonight. When I was inspecting the finish, I discovered that I have a few tracks from by Dad’s thichness sander that remain in the birdseye dial frame pieces. Bummer. I am going to have to go back and resand the dial frame. I was working ahead on those so it shouldn’t be an issue. I am ready to put the shelf dados in the sides. That will be the next installment. Thanks for following along with me. It’s 13 weeks and 2 days until the wedding.

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Fri, 17 Jun 2011 03:21:33 GMThttp://lumberjocks.com/kenn/blog/23894kennkennWedding Clock #8: Tapers & Out of the Shophttp://lumberjocks.com/kenn/blog/23519
This feels like real progress! By the end of this blog, you’ll be able to see that this clock is actually coming together. When I stopped last time, I was waiting for the BLO to dry on the front frame. It dried. Now I need to apply shellac. I decided on clear to let the cherry darken and age on it own. Maybe on their 50th wedding anniversary the couple will pull out some old pictures and see how the tone has mellowed, just like them. Here’s a shot of the shellac being applied. I also shellaced the back frame at the same time. The table saw had to double up as a finishing table. Maybe someday my shop will be enlarged but I think I would have to make some more stuff for my wife to get that approved. When it came time to assemble the back frame & panel, I slipped some space balls into the grooves to help keep things centered and prevent excess rattling when the chimes strick. I don’t know if any of that will be an issue but now is the only chance to do it. Then I layed all of the back out and got ready to glue up. Guess what I did next? Duh, glued it up. I read a thing about Bob Lang and Glen Huey, editors at Popular Woodworking, arguing over whether you really needed to put glue on both the mortise and the tenon. I forget who was right but the answer was that you get a better joint if you put glue on both, so That’s what I did. Glue on the tenons will be my MO. Then it was just a matter of slipping the panels into place. Then I glued the other stile and slipped in into place. That sounds easy but I struggled getting all three tenons lined up. They finally went where they belonged. A few clamps and we can wait for the glue to dry. I know the top and bottom are not going to sit flat. The clock tapers on all four sides but I was not sure how much off square I was going to be so I layed out the side taper onto the bench. That let me see how much I need to bevel the top and bottom. It was 3 degrees, if that’s vital info to anybody. I set up the table saw to make those cuts. I took the back fence off my crosscut sled (I’ve been wanting to make a new one and destoying this one is a good first step) and made my cuts, double checking that I had the bevels going the right direction. Then I layed out the tapers onto the front and back. There is a pencil line there, look extra close. I debated all sorts of ways to make this cut. I finally settled on the bandsaw. I put a sacraficial table on it to raise it up to the same height as my table saw. They have a space conflict on long outfeed projects like this one. I guess that’s back to the “make more stuff for the wife” issue. Here’s the cut. Then I clamped the two together and planed the tapers smooth. What’s that saying … easy, peasy, lemon squeezy. Time to come out of the shop and into the light. That deserved two pictures, don’t you think. Real progress, as promised. They look good. They’ll rest upstairs while I make the side panels. That way they’ll stay clean and the sunshine can hit them to start that 50 year mellowing project. Thanks for following along. I’m back to surfacing lumber so I’ll wait to update you once that’s done and there something exciting to report.]]>
Sat, 28 May 2011 02:34:16 GMThttp://lumberjocks.com/kenn/blog/23519kennkennWedding Clock #7: Three "F's" or Disaster Recoveryhttp://lumberjocks.com/kenn/blog/23491
The Front Frame is Finished (ala 3 “F’s). Here’s how I made the front frame and recovered from my disaster. I started by jointing the inside edges of the stiles flat and square with my #7 plane. The a little layout and I was off and running …no, I meant mortising. Chopping down and levering up the waste, I made a mortise. Checking to make sure I made a square mortise as I went along. As you know, the ends of the mortise are saved for last. Once the center is excavated, place the chisel in the scribe line and chop, like this—- I did need to clean up the sides on some (ok, truth be told , it was on all ) of the mortises. It is best to use a wide chisel for this job. All I needed to do was to make six of these babies. Here’s the hard one since it was 1” deep and only about a inch wide. Here’s proof that I did all six of them, since the semi-official Lumberjock slogan is “If there are no pictures, it didn’t happen!” Then I went to the table saw and ripped both stiles to the same width. I want to able to use the flat sides to put my clamps on during glue up. Now I have made the 2 stiles (vertical pieces). What’s next? That’s right, make the rails (horizontal pieces). Same process, just shorter. First up is plane them flat and square. Then I carefully cut them to length, adding the tenon length to the distance between the stiles. Then I layed out the tenons. Here they are all lined up and layed out, notice how I just marked all of my tenon details right on the rail to help keep things straight. I made a test piece from part of a rail that I saved from when I cut the rails to width. This allowed me to check the table saw setup. I wanted to be close to my tenon width but also wanted to leave a bit to trim with my skew block plane. This way I could be sure of getting a tight fit. I know alot of people use a tenoning jig and the table saw to cut tenons, and I have used that technique in the past. This is what I like doing now and it seems to give me the results I am looking for. I leave a little waste from the shoulder. Then I use a chisel to rest in the scribe line and chop the tenon shoulder, undercutting it a little. Most of them fit perfectly straight off the bench. I did have one that needed a trim on one side to get the great fit I was wanting. I made sure that I was square, especially since I was going to be fitting doors into these openings later. Here’s a look at the bottom rail before I screwed it up (see previous blog “Disaster Strikes”). Once I recovered from my disaster, I was ready to glue up the front frame. Some clamps and a little time, I’ve made a face frame. I sanded everything flush then put a coat of BLO on and let it dry.

That’s where I am now. As a reminder, this is my goal – except in cherry.

Let’s keep going, the wedding is 16 weeks and 2 days.

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Fri, 27 May 2011 01:24:27 GMThttp://lumberjocks.com/kenn/blog/23491kennkennWedding Clock #6: DISASTER STRIKES!http://lumberjocks.com/kenn/blog/23416
I was making great progress on the clock. The wedding is 17 weeks away. My wife commented that she thought it would be done in time today. I headed done to my shop. I’ve been working on the front frame and thought I might be gluing it up today. Here’s a look at the lower rail, nice tight joint. I needed to put the profile on the bottom of that rail. As you may remember from my last post, I am using a huge fortsner bit to establish the curve and then bandsawing out the waste between the holes. So I set up to drill the first hole. Just as I was about to break through the rail, DISASTER! Here’s a look at the pieces moved to the workbench for analysis. This can’t be fixed. What happened? Why did it happened? What am I going to do?

I think that when I set up the bit, I moved the bit into the wood so the center spur would track better than it did on my back frame. That put too much pressure on the wood as the bit exited the wood and was cutting the end grain with virtually no back up strength. I have to make a new rail. I jointed a new piece of wood flat, ran it through he planer to get it to thickness. It’s a pretty good match as far as the other rails go, not as good as my broken one that I cut from the same board. I’ll have to live with it. Plus I am going to profile the bottom of this one before I cut it to length and put the tenons on it. Here’s new clamping set up to drill the hole. Let’s hope this works. It started making noise as the spur exited the rail so I stopped drilling. I’m going to drill the other side now. Now I flipped the rail over and started drilling from the other side. I chickened out and stopped drilling once I had cut a small profile in the backside. I am going to clean this up with my cute little bow saw. That’s better. Now I’ll use a chisel and some rasps to finish this up. Then it is over to the bandsaw to remove the center section, then the table saw to cut this to length. A bit of careful layout and measurement, and I removed most of the waste from the tenons at the table saw. Here’s where I am at now. I now need to clean up the tenons and fit them to the mortises. No more predictions on when I’ll be done, no more over confidence causing bad mojo. Let’s hope this is the worst problem I have to deal with. Next post, I hope, will show the front assembled. Thanks for following along.

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Tue, 24 May 2011 00:19:46 GMThttp://lumberjocks.com/kenn/blog/23416kennkennWedding Clock #5: Don't Get Mad at Me, The Backhttp://lumberjocks.com/kenn/blog/23287
As a reminder, I am making an Art and Craft style clock based on one at The Grove Park Inn for my eldest daughter’s upcoming wedding. See post #2 for the goal. I’ve decided to make the back frame and panel assembly first. A little sharpening is order before I get started. Next I planed the stiles flat and square with my Lie-Nielsen #7. Then I just couldn’t handle the suspense anymore and had to lay out the panels and rails to see how it was going to look. This allowed me to select which panel was the upper and which was the lower. I set my mortise guage directly from the mortise chisel and then layed out the mortises. Since I am going to use a plow plane to make the grooves in the stiles, I need a mortise for the plane to start and stop. Here is one of those mortises. Now I can run those grooves. Look at those purty shavings. OK, that’s not fair. I know you want to see my plow plane in action, not just a picture of what it does. By popular demand … drum roll, please … I ran the grooves in the rails while I was set up. The middle rail gets grooves in the top and bottom, the others only get one edge grooved. Now I am going to use those grooves to help line up my mortise chisels while I chop out the other two mortises in each stile. Oops, I pulled the chisel out but it was stuck and I sliced a bit of a cut on my figer. I “signed” the piece with a little DNA, see it there on the left. Here is pair of matching mortises. What do we do once we made mortises? That’s right, make the tenons. I’m going to use the table saw to define the shoulders. I could use the saw and do it by hand, but time is slipping away on me and I’ve got to get this done before the wedding actually occurs, right? Then I removed the waste with a dado blade set up, just to speed up production a bit. For those of you following along, I am down to 18 weeks until the wedding. They still need fitted with a plane and some hand work so don’t try to throw me out of the club just because I cheated a bit and used the table saw back there. Look, I can use a saw to trim the tenons to length. I want to make sure these stay square while I am working on them. Once again, my impatience is showing. I have enough of the joinery done that I can get a sneak peak at how this is going to look. Those are the front stiles sitting off to the side, their grain match is fabulous while the back is … well, it’s the back. Well, now those panels need a rabbet cut on one side so they will fit into those neato plow plane grooves. Back to the table saw for speed versus the rabbet plane, sorry … again. I did clean them up and do the final fitting with my skew plane, still ok? Not too mad about the table saw now, are you? This stile fits good, that’s progress. My plan was to hand plane all final surfaces so I took my #4 1/2 to the panels. Unfortunately, I feel the time pressure closing in on me. I switched to the air sander. I made the switch mostly because I had some tear out and knew there would be more. Plus, there is no way I am not using sandpaper on those birdseye shelves that are coming up. Here’s another look at where I am headed. I needed to put some finish on those panels. I am going to put a coat of BLO (Boiled Linseed Oil) followed by clear shellac. Now you can start with the “oooh, ahhh, that looks great!” Confession time, using the plow plane dinged up the end of the starting/stopping mortises. It seems the skate hit the stile where it would show. My solution, add a shoulder to the bottom edge of the tenon. Can you see the ding and the layout for the shoulder? Let’s clamp this together and sand it all flush and smooth. The bottom rail gets a radius profiled onto it. I am going to use a huge a@# forstner bit that I bought for just this job. It’s 3 3/8” and I ran the drill press at about 300 rpm to accomadate the bit size. That worked great, well worth the expense since I am going to put the same profile on the bottom of each side. A little trim, connect the holes at the bandsaw and … Here’s what we’ve got. Then I cleaned that up with a block plane and some rasps. You’ll have to trust me that on because those pics came out blurry. I put some BLO on the stiles and rails. I couldn’t take the suspense, here it is, no glue yet. That’s it for now. Next, I’ll be making the frame. It should go easier since there are no panels to make and fit. It’ll be hard enough when I have to fit doors to those frame opening. Thanks for following along with me, leave me a note of encouragement since I have 17 weeks and 3 days to get this done.]]>
Wed, 18 May 2011 03:35:13 GMThttp://lumberjocks.com/kenn/blog/23287kennkennWedding Clock #4: Hired an Apprenticehttp://lumberjocks.com/kenn/blog/22895
I am still milling lumber, trying to get everything ready for some joinery. Once I get one side flat, I mark it “Flat”. That just helps me keep track of who’s where as I work the pieces and parts. Here is one of the birdseye maple shelves that I glued up then hand planed one side flat, mostly, and is now ready to be taken down to its final thickness. Sorry this picture is a little blurry but you can see how flat the wood is. Just so you can see the results of my sweat, here’s a 30 gallon trash can ready to go to the recycling center. Once I got these pieces flat on one side, I packed them up. I took them out to my Dad’s who has a thickness sander. My plan was to cheat a bit and run my glued up pieces through the sander. Here’s Dad helping to get things set up. We tried running the birdseye shelves through, but the sandpaper kept tearing. We did successfully run the birdsye that I am going to use to frame the copper dial. I hope you can see that figure. Thanks to Barlow for sending me the wood, it’s amazing. Well, I had to regroup and decide how I wanted to get may panels down to thickness. I don’t mind handplaning them but it is a lot of work and it will take some time. Although this clock isn’t ticking, my time to get it done is ticking away. I have a friend with a wide planer that I thought was 20”, turns out it is 15” and not much help since my planer is 13” and the widest panel is 20”. I finally decided to call a local cabinet shop and the shop manager, Jim, said I could come by Sat morning. Here we are getting started. I made the bride come along and take pictures, hey, she might as well see what all goes into making this clock, right? Here’s a back panel coming out of the sander. I spent most of the time “catching” as the wood came through. Jim was the brains. When we were running the last of the birdseye shelves through, Jim switched to 120 grit to help me out with the sanding. Then he let me on the smart side of the machine. I have got to get one of these! That is the easy way to prep stock, it comes out nice and smooth. Of course it is hooked up to a massive dust collector, needs a huge electical supply and takes up a bit of floor space. Father’s Day is coming so maybe I should pick one out for the kids to chip in on. I better just plan on being nice to Jim. One board looked like it was moving a bit, we saw a little cupping at the cabinet shop. When I got them home I clamped the stack to my workbench. That’s the story of my appentice, the sander. I guess I’ll call him “Sandy”. He did nice work and I’ll use him again when I need to. Next up is some actual joinery as I am going to make the back of the clock. Thanks for following along.]]>
Sat, 30 Apr 2011 16:58:46 GMThttp://lumberjocks.com/kenn/blog/22895kennkennWedding Clock #3: Making Panelshttp://lumberjocks.com/kenn/blog/22794
It’s time to glue up the panels that are needed. I’m making a frame and panel as the back of the clock that will consist of 2 panels stacked on top of each other, held in place by the 3 horizontal rails and 2 vertical stiles. So I’ll need 2 panels for the back. Here’s one of those. Note the carpenter’s triangle that I use to keep the parts aligned. I have already glued the bottom two pieces together but we’ll walk through the rest of making this one. Next, I’ll need to prepare the edge for glueing by jointing it flat with my Lie-Nielsen #7 plane. Once it’s flat and straight, I test its fit with its mate. I look closely for any gaps at the joint and through trial and error, sometimes lots of error, I get them to mate tightly.Now I align the pieces in the clamps and get ready to glue up. Unfortunately, I am about to make a mistake … I can hear you yelling at me but I am not paying attention to you. Let’s slather glue on this baby and plow ahead! We’ll get back to that later. I have three interior shelves to make and have bought some great looking birdseye maple from our own http://lumberjocks.com/barlow and here is a shelf layed out. Here’s the other two shelves. Now we go back to edge jointing the mating surfaces. I’ll use my straight edge and square to check my progress while the board is still in the vise, it just saves time by not pulling a piece in and out that has a noticable flaw in it.

Alright, this shelf looks good. Please note that I have learned my lesson and that triangle is correct on this one. You know the glue and clamps are next. Here is my walk of shame. I’ve cut that back panel apart and re – jointed the edge. Since I hand plane my surfaces, I check the grain direction and glue up panels with the face grain all running the same direction whenever possible. It makes things go easier later on. Here I am completing the correction of my mistake. I wish you guys would have said someting when you saw me glueing it up wrong, come on, help a fellow out! That triangle is in place now. Since you’ve stuck with me so far, I thought you deserved a little woodworkers porn. Here are the planes I’m using for edge jointing, a Lie Nielsen #7, #5 and Low Angle #5 or #62. And some shavings they made. Back to business. I’ve glued up the 8 panels I need so far. I have 2 sides that I’ll glue up later but since it’ll be awhile until I need them, They will wait until then. Here the panels are, all stacked nice neat by the router table. Now I will start to flatten one side of each of those panels. This one will be the top of the clock. I use a scrub plane to hog off most of the waste before switching up to the #5. First I scrub plane down a bit and check where I am on the path to flat with the winding sticks. If you haven’t done this before, you lay two flat straight edges at opposite ends of a board and site across the surface. Any twist shows up easily and then you can remove material from the offending corners until you get to flat. Here’s a glance at this, but this panel is close already. Then by planing diagonially, I keep taking material off. The lumber crayon or pencil lines tell me where I have yet to plane. Then I switch diagonials and plane some more. Now you can see I am down to where there is almost no “valley” running down the middle of this panel. Let’s check to make sure there is no wind in this one. I then plane a bit with the #5 to give a smoother surface but I don’t have any pictures of that, you’ll have to imagine those pretty curly shavings coming out of the plane. Look back at the previous pictures if you need to. Since I know you are checking out all the stuff in the backgroud, those cherry boards stacked over that left edge of the sticks are the sides awaiting their turn.

That’s where I am at as of now. There are 21 weeks until the wedding and still alot to do on this clock. Next up will be the apprentice I will bring in to help out some. Thanks for following along.

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Mon, 25 Apr 2011 00:31:53 GMThttp://lumberjocks.com/kenn/blog/22794kennkennWedding Clock #1: Milling Stockhttp://lumberjocks.com/kenn/blog/22756
This should actually be Part 2 of the series, sorry. After that swich, I’ll have the rest of them correct.

I have to start milling my stock. Here’s the stile and rails for the front and back of the clock. The sides are solid pieces that I’ll glue up later from 2 boards. For now, I’ve got work to do. I’m starting on a rail to get warmed up. Here I am checking to see where I am off. Now I’ll get it flat on one side. Next up is flattening one side of the stiles. Here is a progress shot. Confession time … I use a planer to bring the other side into flat and then skim the original hand planed side to take some off both sides to keep anything from twisting. Boy was my son pleased to get his picture taken for this blog … NOT! Here they are all lined up, looking pretty. I will hand plane each surface again, later, after the joinery. Then you and I will be only ones who know I used some electricity. I think of that planer as my 18th century apprentice who works hard for little pay.

My eldest daughter is getting married! They got engaged Summer, 2010 and the wedding is planned for Sept. 17, 2011. I told them I’d like to make them something special as a wedding from my wife and me. This is what we all agreed would be a great gift. Never mind that I haven’t done anything in Arts & Crafts Style and that this is my reference, Bruce Johnson’s book on The Grove Park Inn’s furniture. I’m going to build it in Cherry (that’s what she wants, and after making that bed for my son out of tiger maple, cherry sounds great). First up is to study the plans. I had some blank spots and some questions so I sent an email to Bob Lang, Popular Woodworking’s expert on Arts & Crafts furniture. Within 12 hours, he answered my questions and had me on the right track! Here’s the details I worked out. Next, I wrote up a procedure list. I find that this really helps to mentally build a big project first. Next, I acquired the necessary parts like a hand hammered dial, the mechanism and the hardware I planned on using.

That’s my cherry in the background. Now that I have my plan, next up is the woodworking part of this project! Thanks for following along with me.

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Fri, 22 Apr 2011 21:39:33 GMThttp://lumberjocks.com/kenn/blog/22742kennkennBending Wood #1: Bending Windsor Chair Partshttp://lumberjocks.com/kenn/blog/14935
These videos are bending continuous-arm (c-arm) Windsor chair parts. I use locally harvested, green, red oak that has been split and rived down to a workable size. Then I use a draw knife, hand planes, and spoke shaves to shape the oak piece. Here is the exciting part…

If cracks occur, they are repaired with thin CA glue and C-clamps. In the past few weeks, I’ve done five c-arms and four have needed repairs. These failures are common with this type of chair due to the extreme bend.

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Sat, 03 Apr 2010 21:30:45 GMThttp://lumberjocks.com/kenn/blog/14935kennkennRoubo Bench - Becoming usablehttp://lumberjocks.com/kenn/blog/10009
I have made lots of progress and actually am using my new bench some, I’ve just needed to get an update here. After putting the top on the base, I marked out so I could start hand planing.I used my scrub plane to get things close, that’s the scrub plane’s results above, and then this #5 to get the top flat and without wind.Here’s a picture of the top in “near” flat and smooth. FYI, I ended up with about 45 gallons of shavings.To trim the ends to final length, I rigged up a straight edge and used my circular saw, here’s my set up.A “little” work and I had a nice smooth end. I put some mineral spirits on so I could appereciate the results.Next order of business is installing my Record style vise. I made some wooden jaws that overlap the top out of cherry scrap. I used a dado blade to hog out most of the waste, leaving a ridge on both sides. Here’s a look at them with the vise clamped in place.I clamped the jaws in place and marked them for length.Here’s my son tightening up the bolts to hold the vise in place. He’s anxious for me to get this done because the first project to come off this bench is supposed to be for him.Now I’ve got a working vise installed, yeah!One more time over the top with the big boy, a #7, going cross grain to get to flat.I wanted to put my dog holes in next so that when I did the final smoothing I wouldn’t have any problems with them needing further smoothing. Here’s my router doing its thing.Since the top is nearly 4” thick, I couldn’t go all the way through the top and had to finish the job with a drill. I choose to go with the hand brace and auger bit. The result was a arm that could not move for 2 days. Finishing 40 holes in hard maple was too big of a job for me but luckily my family members took pity and each did a few holes to get them finished.Funny digression…when my wife first saw the holes she was shocked that I would put holes into this bench top that I had been busting my butt to get flat..she really thought I’d messed up this thing.

Next I went work on the leg vise. I forgot to take a picture of what I started with but you’ll get to see the offcut in a minute. Here I am using a taper jig to make a cut on the table saw. I took the offcut from here and glued them onto the top so that I would have more width at the top of the vise jaws. Then I cut a mortise in the bottom of the jaws for the parrallel guide that I had previously made.Here’s what it took to get this job done. This is my first hand chopped mortise with these chisels and I was very pleased with how easy they made the task.I wanted to glue and pin this is place and my daughter loved making the dowels for it, or more accurately banging a piece of wood through the dowel plate was a blast for her.A little trimming of the pins and I think this might be ready.Yep, it’s ready.Here’s the offcut of the 6’ ash log that I started with standing next to the leg vise. I scrub planed it, then used a #5 to flaten one side, then ran it throught he planer. I am going to use the offcut to make my sliding deadman. This is from a tree my Dad cut down for me and we’ve air dried for 2 years. The original plan was to use it to make a shaving horse but I ended up deciding that this would be more useful for the type of work I do.A couple of comments about the leg vise. If I was doing it all over, I’d have the bottom of the vise be a full inch above the floor. It tends to get hung up on my mat but I’ll change that situation soon to correct this problem. I also went with a tight fit of the screw in the jaw face thinking that this would provide more support and be better. I had to go back and rasp out the hole some because the screw was too hard to turn. I thought it would work its way looser and be ok, but I couldn’t wait for that and just opened it up a smidge. I made three handles from some ash scrap from the same tree the jaws came from…and am still not happy with any of them. So I put one of them on and decided that I’ll rive a piece of oak from a windsor chair making log that I’m going to buy in a few months. Just a planned improvement and a minor thing to do later.I bought a piece if leather to line the leg vise with and decided on contact cement and the best way to attach the leather. Here we are ready to put them together. You can see some holes the bugs ate into the log, it’s a workbench is my attitude. I want to use it to make high quality pieces, not make a muesum quality workbench. All of the bench below the top is from free wood my Dad gave me…too bad he didn’t have some hard maple I could have used for the top, huh?No better way to clamp the leather in place then to use the vise itself. I think this picture also shows the struggle I’m having closing the screw, hence loosening the hole some was required.I had 2 “made in tiawan” hodfasts that really didn’t hold anything very fast. I looked on the internet, what an amazing thing, and found a blacksmith about a hour away from me. He had some old reference books from the blacksmith end of things and agreed to make 4 holdfasts for me. Here I am glueing leather pads onto them.Here’s the four holdfasts lined up. Let me tell you, he did a great job. One wack and these babies hold! I used them to hold something I was crosscutting, the wood didn’t move. It was like a light bulb went on above my head…”So this is how this is supposed to work!”

I think that’s it for now. This is almost done. My to-do list only includes making the sliding deadman and its guide, adding cleats and a shelf on the strechers, and maybe adding a planning stop. That will be the next and final blog before this becomes a completed project.

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Mon, 13 Jul 2009 04:27:57 GMThttp://lumberjocks.com/kenn/blog/10009kennkennRoubo Bench - Base Completedhttp://lumberjocks.com/kenn/blog/8648
It is time to assemble the base for this massive bench. I gathered some air dried oak that I had left over from wedge stock when making windsor chairs and my drawknife.

I carefully took the oak down to 5/16” thick since that was the size of holes I chose to drill to hold this all together.

At first, I made the pegs square and cut them to length. Then I wised up and realized that if I carefully split that baby, I could save myself some effort and get 2 sets of pegs from one piece of oak, duh!

Working on the short strechers first, I glued the tenon (Notice the artistic camera angle my daughter came up with).

A little glue into the mortise, and I slid this one into place.

Then all I needed to do was pound the peg home. The ones on the short strechers went together great.

A quick trim with the saw,

and then a carving gouge.

I had this one done in no time at all.

The long strechers required moving the assembly process to the floor. Here I am slipping the strecher into place, of course both strechers had to be done at the same time.

They fit good and I was ready to move on.

The top end of the long mortises needs glue and then I put the other short strecher assembly on top.

Then I turned this thing onto its side to drive the pegs in.

Notice the amazing camera work as my assistant captures the exact moment the hammer hits the pegs. I did have to sort through a few shots but she got the exact one we were after without slowing me down.

I continued with the trimming as before.

I did have a peg break on these long strechers but it was not noticable in the finished look. I guesss some of the integrity is comprimised but I don’t see how it will affect the final function of the bench since I did glue the joint and one peg is going to hold that joint together.

After the base was assembled, one daughter helped lift it onto the bench top while the other daughter took the photos. Who got the better end of that deal? When is their brother getting home from college?

I checked the fit of the legs into the bench top.

One leg needs its tenon trimmed.

I hate to admit it, but this is because I have a strecher joint that did not close all the way. I have concluded that I had a bit of racking and that the base in not dead square. Unfortunately its too late. These timbers are massive. The base wieghs 110 lbs. It’s tough to move and test fit. It’s a learning process. Those are my excuses but I am sure I could come up with more if I have to.

Here’s the base waiting to flipped into place now that I have the shop cleaned, a little. If you click on the picture and go to photo bucket, you can see its predicessor siting off to the right in the full photo. The plan is to place the base, slid the top onto the old bench, lift and flip the top, place the top on the base,

Amazing, it actually work as planned! Here it is in place.

All I need to do is peg the top to the bottom, no glue in case I ever want/need to move the bench. If that happens, I’ll drill the pegs out and have my son and and his strongest friend lift it off and put it where it needs to be. I did use my drawbore tool on the pegs but it didn’t help. I still had several pegs break. Either I had the pegs a bit too thick or I offset the holes in the tenons too much. Either way, I can’t lift the top off the base at any leg and they all went in far enough that all you see is a square peg.

Next up, I sweat my a** off again as I work on flatenning the top. This side needs to be dead flat and smooth. Plus it matters so no more mistakes, right?

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Wed, 06 May 2009 06:25:35 GMThttp://lumberjocks.com/kenn/blog/8648kennkennRoubo Bench - Getting the base readyhttp://lumberjocks.com/kenn/blog/8584
Well its time for me to get all of the mortise and tenons ready for the base. First I had a few holes that I wanted to drill in the legs for hold downs ( actually for holding up). My drill press wouldn’t go all of the way through the legs so I finished the holes with a bit brace and a 3/4” auger bit checking for when the point came through. Then I flipped the leg and finished them.

I wanted to get my strecher length right on, so I took my measurement right off the legs.

I layed out my tenon shoulders and got out my tenon saw to cut them.

Sorry I got all interested in fitting all those tenons and didn’t get any pictures of the process. I did get some shop help though and I put my daughter to work champferring the bottoms of the legs. The theory is that there won’t be any chips on one side of the legs when you move it. I had to see how much this thing is going to weigh so I brought the bathroom scale down and weighed the parts. The base is 110 lbs. and the top is too heavy to fit on the scale at this point. I don’t think it’ll move but had the helper use a chiseland then a plane to put a 45 degree edge on the bottom of the legs.Next up was to rout the groove for the deadman in the underside of the bench. I made several passes.Gradully lowering the bit until I had a 3/4” wide groove that’s 1 1/8” deep. I think that will be fine for the deadman to fit into securely.When I was done, I squared up the corners. I thought about leaving them alone, but I like square corners.I figured since the base wasn’t assembled yet, I should put the flange for the leg vise on now while it could lay flat, saving me from crawling under the bench to install it later.

Now it’s time to drill some holes. I plan on pegging/drawboring this all together so layed out my locations and drilled my holes with a backer board to prevent blow out on the inside of my mortises. The small square in my hand is helping me drill straight in the vertical axis, I can see the bit fine to keep the horizontal axis square.

Then I finished the holes on the other side of the mortise.Then I slipped the tenon piece, in the picture it’s the leg, into place and marked the hole center with the tip of the bit.Next is to slightly offset the tenon hole TOWARDS the shoulder (I was worried that I ‘d go the wrong way so I kept yelling this to myself, thankfully no problems).Just drill a straight hole and I’ve got it licked.

You know the saying about round holes and square pegs, and I’ve driven square pegs into round holes before (FYI the square edges just cut the surface and you end up with a square looking peg) but I wanted to give the pegs a little help.Well that’s alot of work for me to get done. Cutting and fitting 8 tenons and getting all the little things ready so I can assemble the base. I think this bench is about to make a whole lot of progress. I have it in my head that I should be able to use it in two weeks. We’ll see if that’s true.